Nelima Sitati Munene
Nelima Sitati Munene is the Executive Director of African Career Education and Resources, Inc. (ACER), a leading advocacy organization in the northwest suburbs of the Twin Cities that engages with and listens to people of African heritage to identify and take action on the issues that matter to them, working together to secure racial and economic equity.
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Nelima is a dedicated community servant and organizer with more than 20 years of experience. She is passionate about developing leaders who can transform communities through civic engagement and policy advocacy and has led campaigns around issues on women's rights, racial discrimination, housing inequality and economic justice. In her current role, she works as a bridge builder between government systems and community members, creating strategic partnerships to improve the health, education, housing and economic development opportunities for people of African heritage in the region, state and nation.
As a policy expert and thought leader, Nelima has been appointed to important government commissions and committees, including the Brooklyn Park Community Engagement Taskforce, through which Nelima played a key role in creating the city’s first community engagement initiative to include the growing immigrant and community of color population in the city’s decision-making processes.
At the regional level, Nelima served on the Metropolitan Council’s Housing Policy Planning Group, which created the first plan in 25 years to address housing challenges in the seven-county metro region, and chaired the Equity Advisory Committee for six years, during which time she led the conceptualization and development of a regional Equity Policy and the creation and implementation of an Equity Framework to begin to close the inequities in the region.
At the state level, she was a member of the inaugural Victim Witness Program which initiated and created policy changes in how victims of crime are supported and kept informed by the court system in Minnesota, and has been appointed to taskforces related to housing and immigration by Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and Congressman Dean Phillips respectively.
Nelima also shares her knowledge as a board member for multiple nonprofit organizations, including Women Venture, and the Alliance for Metropolitan Stability. She is the founding chair of Minnesota Africans United, an organization that seeks to unite Africans in Minnesota to address issues that impact the community, and a member the Minnesota chapter of RESULTS, a global advocacy group that lobbies internationally to increase funding for efforts to eliminate global poverty.
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Nelima was a 2013-2014 Humphrey Policy Fellow, a 2015 Shannon Leadership Fellow, and a 2019 Minnesota Young American Leaders Program Fellow.
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Nelima is a graduate of the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities with a degree in Multidisciplinary Studies with a concentration in Engineering, Public Policy and Community Development and is an alumnus of the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs – Center for the Study of Policy and Governance.